Kroger Texas says the spirit of innovation runs through everything the division undertakes. As a result, Houston and Dallas have served as test-and-learn markets for several of Kroger’s national innovations. These include Nuro driverless grocery delivery, a Hispanic concept store and an Asian concept store.
For the Hispanic concept store, Houston was selected as the first test market, as the city is home to the nation’s fourth-largest Hispanic population; the Asian concept store is in Plano, in north Texas, where the local population is 42 percent Asian.
Following these tests, there are now 37 stores in north Texas following one of these ethnic store models, and the findings from the tests are influencing other multicultural designs in regions across the country.
“We want as much as we can possibly hold within our store, all the way from a robust fresh offering to center store aisles expanding, and we’re thinking about multicultural opportunities every day,” said Kroger Texas President Rudy DiPietro. “It’s a huge focus for us in Texas, between the Hispanic population, Asian population, halal and kosher [customers].”…